Security and development
approaches to Central Asia
The EU compared to
China and Russia
Sébastien Peyrouse,
Jos Boonstra and
Marlène Laruelle
working paper 11
May 2012
Abstract
China and Russia are the most influential external actors
in Central Asia, while the EU has substantially increased
its activity and presence in the region since 2007. The
security and development interests of these three actors
are sometimes at odds but can also overlap. The three
actors are usually perceived in terms of different stereotypes. Whereas the EU is known for its emphasis on
democratic values and human rights, Russia is seen as the
main security actor (not including the United States and
its actions in Afghanistan) and China as the main investor
in infrastructure and importer of energy. How do these
stereotypes compare in regard to security and development interests? Is there any scope for cooperation and
coordination or can policies be boiled down to zero-sum
geo-political competition?
EUCAM-SD
This working paper is published as part of the EUCAM-Security and Development project that is implemented by FRIDE
and the Karelian Institute of the University of Eastern Finland. The EUCAM-SD is a key component of the EUCAM programme and focuses on the links between security challenges in the Central Asian region and the need for development in
the broadest sense, including governance, poverty reduction, ethnic tension and social equality. The project aims to offer
new insights and creative thinking on Europe’s role in promoting security and development in Central Asia. EUCAM-SD is
supported by the Wider Europe Initiative of the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
© EUC A M 2 012
I SBN (O n l i ne): 978 - 8 4 - 614 - 6870 - 6
Security and
development approaches
to Central Asia
The EU compared to
China and Russia
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
Sébastien Peyrouse, Jos Boonstra
and Marlène Laruelle
4
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
Table of Contents
Introduction 5
1. The reluctant soldier: Russia
6
1.1. Long term interests
6
1.2. Security
8
1.3. Development
9
2. The silent merchant: China
10
2.1. Long term interests
10
2.2. Security
11
2.3. Development
13
3. The hesitant vicar: The European Union
14
3.1. Long term interests
14
3.2. Security
15
3.3. Development
17
4. Divergences and overlapping interests
19
4.1. The EU and the Russia-China tandem: The values factor
19
4.2. The EU and Russia on security and development
20
4.3. The EU and China on security and development
21
5. Room for cooperation?
21
Concluding remarks
23
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
Introduction
The increased involvement of external actors in
Central Asia is often characterised as a new great
game. If there is a geopolitical game between Russia
and China and to a lesser extent the U.S., EU, Turkey,
Iran, India and Pakistan over influence in Central
Asia it seems to be centred on energy ‒ primarily
gas from Turkmenistan. But there are other factors
at play that counter this perception of the region as
solely a geopolitical struggle between major powers.
First, the Central Asian regimes are not merely
subordinates of external actors but have emerged
as ‘players’ themselves, choosing who to cooperate
with and playing countries against each other.
Second, there is more at stake in Central Asia then
just energy. There is a long list of security threats
ranging from internal threats to stability to regional
ethnic tensions and from bad interregional relations
to negative spill-over effects from Afghanistan.
This report looks at the activities of three external
actors in the sphere of security and development
in Central Asia. The first two are Russia and China,
the most active and influential actors in Central Asia
due to their size and their geographical connection
to the region. Both benefit from their territorial
contiguity with Central Asia; from their structuring
role in the local economies (Russia, thanks to its
Soviet past and the dynamics of regional economic
integration, and China to its exponential trade);
S
ébastien Peyrouse (principal author) is an associate
researcher with FRIDE and the EUCAM Programme
and a senior research fellow with the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies programme. His main
areas of expertise are political systems in Central Asia,
Islam and religious minorities and human security issues.
J
os Boonstra (co-author) is senior researcher at FRIDE
and head of the EUCAM programme. His work focuses
on Eurasian and transatlantic security issues (foremost
EU, NATO and OSCE policies) as well as democratisation
in Eastern Europe, the South Caucasus and Central Asia.
M
arlène Laruelle (co-author) is associate researcher
with FRIDE and the EUCAM Programme. She is also
director of the Central Asia Program at the Elliott School
of International Affairs, George Washington University.
Her main areas of expertise are nationalism, national
identities, intellectual trends and geopolitical conceptions of elites in Russia and Central Asia.
The authors would like to thank Nargis Kassenova, Neil
Melvin and Jeremy Smith for reviewing an earlier version
of this working paper.
5
and from their influence in strategic terms (on the
multilateral level with the Collective Security Treaty
Organisation (CSTO) and the Shanghai Cooperation
Organisation (SCO), and for Moscow also on the
bilateral level).
The third actor is the European Union (EU); a relatively new player in the region that has substantially
increased its activities with Central Asian states since
it formalised a regional strategy in 2007. However,
in the eyes of Brussels Central Asia flies under the
radar as it is not regarded as belonging to either its
southern or eastern neighbourhoods, nor is it part of
any European powers’ historical colonial interests,
such as in sub-Saharan Africa. Central Asia is not a
vital element of European foreign policy strategies
and does not have any priority on the external policy
agenda compared to the EU’s neighbouring countries and large growing economies such as China and
India. Still, one can argue that Europe is overtaking
the United States as the third most important actor
in the region, as over the last few years the U.S. has
seen Central Asia almost exclusively in terms of the
conflict in Afghanistan and so has become a less diversified actor.
Russia is the most influential actor in terms of
hard security and seems to be the only power that
has both the means to react to a crisis and a sense
of responsibility to engage. The responsibility to
react to or to intervene in events in what it sees as
its neighbourhood is limited though and would only
be translated into action if key Russian interests (or
territory) were to be directly affected. In this sense
Russia can be qualified as the ‘reluctant soldier’.
China has increased its economic interests, mainly
through energy imports, in combination with development activities – infrastructure projects for
instance – over the last few years. China is also concerned with Central Asia’s stability, especially in
relation to possible domestic disturbances in the
Xinjiang region. Besides playing an active role in the
Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), Beijing
has largely acted unilaterally and mostly stays out of
regional and multilateral forums; hence China could
be described as a ‘silent merchant’.
The EU is engaged in many fields in Central Asia
ranging from energy interests to soft security activities and from education to promoting human
rights standards. This values driven agenda of human rights, democracy, good governance and rule of
6
law is often at odds with energy interests but also at
times clashes with security and development concerns. Europe’s interests in Central Asia are less direct and substantial compared to those of China and
in particular Russia. Fine-tuning of such activities
is important for the EU due to its lack of leverage
and limited resources. This combination of values
with other hard interests could be said to resemble
a ‘hesitant vicar’ hovering between devotion to his
faith and hesitation over the role of religion in harsh
daily life.
This paper will discuss Russian, Chinese and
European involvement in the region. It proposes
that security and development are the main issues faced by contemporary Central Asia, and that
though the role of external actors in shaping them
is important the extent of each actor’s investment
differs. Energy is obviously a driver of interest in
the region, and indeed Turkmen gas may become a
cause of direct competition between Russia, China
and the EU. However, energy diversification does
not impact directly upon the local security and development environment.
Where security and development assistance is
concerned there is little scope for bringing these
countries together in coordinated cooperation. For
Europe the most natural allies in Central Asia (and
mostly elsewhere) are the U.S. and joint regional organisations, foremost NATO and the OSCE. When it
comes to security possible cooperation and coordination could be developed based on Afghanistan’s
links to Central Asia, most directly in terms of border management and control programmes. In the
development sphere there is even less scope for
coordination, let alone joint action on a bilateral or
trilateral basis outside of international institutions.
There might though be a few opportunities for coordination that the EU could explore, for instance with
Russia in the field of education or initiatives with
China on rural development.
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
• How should the EU’s role in the security-development nexus develop in Central Asia taking into account the dominant roles of Russia and China?
1. The reluctant soldier: Russia
1.1. Long term interests
In the first years following the demise of the USSR,
Russian political elites, then in a period of total
transformation, were largely uninterested in the
future of the Central Asian region, and only kept up
a minimal influence, centred on the securitisation
of its southern borders, denuclearisation, rental
of the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and
committing peacekeeping forces to the Tajik civil
war. Russian interest in the region was progressively
reshaped during the second half of the 1990s, and
grew in magnitude in the 2000s.1 Since the end of
the decade, Moscow has considered its re-conquest
of great power status to be partly dependant on
strengthening its economic, financial and strategic
integration with post-Soviet states; mainly Belarus
and Kazakhstan; to a lesser extent Kyrgyzstan and
Tajikistan; potentially Armenia; and if possible
Ukraine.2
Top 4 Russian interests in Central Asia
This working paper addresses the following
questions:
• How are security and development interpreted by
Russia, China and the EU?
• What are the divergences in their approaches and
are there overlapping strategies?
• Is there any room for cooperation between the
three actors or are patterns of competition destined
to intensify?
1.
Protecting Russian territory from destabilising
factors emanating from Central Asia (militant
extremism and drug trafficking).
2.
Providing security to the region but restricting
intervention and engagement by other external
actors.
3.
Controlling part of the Central Asian
hydrocarbon resources, as well as other raw
materials and assets.
4.
Confirming the region’s status as part of the
Russian “sphere of influence” (through regional
integration projects, Central Asian support
for Russian stances on the international scene,
symbolic protection of Russian minorities, and
promotion of Russian culture and language).
1
L. Jonson, Vladimir Putin and Central Asia: The Shaping of Russian
Foreign Policy (London: I.B. Tauris, 2004).
2
A. Suzdaltsev, “Politics Ahead of the Economy”, Russia in Global
Affairs, 9 April 2010, http://eng.globalaffairs.ru/number/n_14783.
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
Risks of instability constitute the main motivation
for Moscow’s activism in the region and explain
its mainly reactive policy. This potential instability
could impact Russia itself: the belief that the
country is vulnerable to instability from the south
is dominant among Russian elites. But instability
could also force the Kremlin to intervene directly
though the cost of a military intervention would
be high in terms of criticism from the international
community, military losses, financial burden and
logistical difficulties. Another driver is economic.
Control over Central Asian hydrocarbons, uranium
and electricity is part of the Russian government’s
central strategy to gain mastery of the so-called
Near Abroad. Finally, for Russia to confirm its great
power status and its role as a regional driver in
Eurasia, Moscow needs Central Asia, or at least some
countries in the region, to identify themselves as
being in its “sphere of influence”, both economically
and strategically, through their participation in
regional integration projects.
Soft power elements also play an important, though
secondary role. The protection of Russian minorities,
the promotion of Russian language, culture and
media in a still partly Russian-speaking area, and
the flows of labour migration from Central Asia to
Russia are barely utilised by the Kremlin, but they
do offer tools for building a longer-term partnership
between Russia and Central Asia. These offer Russia
opportunities for leverage: familiarity with the
Russian language, whose dominance has not been
unseated by English, Turkish or Chinese, remains a
major cultural element for the local middle classes
and the elites.3 Russia continues to be viewed as the
intermediary of European culture in Central Asia, and
this tradition is strengthened by labour migrations,
thanks to which about five million Central Asian
migrants and their families, often from rural areas,
now have close ties with Russia.4
Russia’s hierarchy of interests in Central Asia
has been reinforced over the last few years.
Factors such as the revival of an allegedly Islamic
insurgency in the Rasht Valley, the Kyrgyz political
crises, and the interethnic conflict in Osh in 2010, as
3
4
For a comprehensive overview of the instruments of pressure that
Russia has at its disposal in relation to its immediate neighbours in the
former Soviet Union, see Russian leverage on the CIS and the Baltic
States, by Jacob Hedenskog and Robert L. Larsson (Stockholm: Swedish Defence Research Agency, 2007).
M. Laruelle (ed.), Migration and Social Upheaval as the Face of Globalization in Central Asia (London: Brill, 2012).
7
well as preparations for the post-2014 situation in
Afghanistan, are pushing Moscow into prioritising a
security-oriented reading of the region and a more
proactive position. This hierarchy can also be explained by the diversity of Russian actors involved.
Russia’s strategy is not cohesive, and the interest
in Central Asia among security services, diplomatic
circles, state corporations, private actors and the
public is not unified. Russia’s policy towards the
region is primarily shaped by the security apparatus, then by state corporations or large firms with
special relationships with the authorities, and only
after that by diplomatic circles and the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs. In public opinion, Central Asia is
seen as nothing but a burden; a region that generates problems for Russia and in which less involvement would be welcome.
Moreover, some of the drivers of Russia’s influence
are fragile. The ruling elite have almost no longterm vision of the kind of relationship they
would like to build with the region, nor have they
developed a strategy that would establish Central
Asia as anything other than Russia’s geographical
and political appendage.5 This could mean that in
the coming years Russia may regress to a position
on par with other actors in the region for two main
reasons. First, its influence is becoming more and
more fragmented on a country-by-country basis: it
is expected to remain a vital and global partner for
Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan; to continue as a still
important but less welcome ally of Tajikistan; but
to become a more minimal actor in Uzbekistan and
Turkmenistan. Central Asia, qua regional entity, has
lost its relevance in Russian regional policies. None
of the multilateral structures – i.e., the Collective
Security Treaty Organisation, the Eurasian Economic
Community, and the Customs Union – include all five
states, and henceforth Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and
Tajikistan will be the countries, almost exclusively,
targeted. Second, the Russian economic presence
is faced with stiff competition from China and
the EU, and specialises in only a few niche areas
(hydrocarbons, uranium, electricity and transport)
and does not have the resilience of Chinese trade.
Moscow’s desire to push forward with a Common
Economic Space (CES) with supranational functions
is mainly targeted at the dynamic economy of
Kazakhstan, but is also intended to draw Bishkek
and Dushanbe closer into its orbit. This is not so
5
M. Laruelle, “Russian Policy on Central Asia and the Role of Russian
Nationalism”, Silk Road Papers (Washington D.C.: The Central AsiaCaucasus Institute and Silk Road Studies Program, 2008).
8
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
Russian imports, exports and total trade with Central Asian states in 2010 in millions of Euros1
Imports from Russia
Kazakhstan
Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Turkmenistan
Uzbekistan
1
4,238.4
810.4
646.8
600.6
1,382.8
(18.7%)
(15%)
(32.2%)
(14.2%)
(21.4%)
Rank
3
2
1
3
1
Exports to Russia
1,780.8
268.7
76.9
101.9
1,047.8
(4.9%)
(32.1%)
(8.5%)
(4%)
(24.1%)
Rank
3
1
3
8
1
Total trade
6,019.2
1,079.1
723.7
702.5
2,430.6
(10.3%)
(17.3%)
(24.9%)
(10.3%)
(22.5%)
Rank
3
2
1
4
1
Table based on information from 2011 European Commission statistics, http://ec.europa.eu/trade/creating-opportunities/bilateral-relations/countries-and-regions/ (accessed 22 October 2011).
much for their economic capabilities but in order to
cement Russia’s legitimacy in ensuring the security
of these two weak states. However, the Kyrgyz and
Tajik elites know that the Customs Union and the
potential Eurasian Union would make Russia an
even more significant stakeholder in their domestic
affairs, hence their reluctance to join even if their
dependency on Russia at the economic level is very
pronounced.
1.2. Security
Security remains the first driver shaping Russia’s
involvement in Central Asia. The challenges are
multiple, as any destabilisation in the weakest
(Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan), or the most unpredictable
(Uzbekistan), of the countries could have immediate
repercussions in Russia. This could include an
Islamist infiltration; an increase in the inflow of
drugs reaching the Russian population, which is
already widely targeted by drug traffickers; a loss of
control over the export networks of hydrocarbons,
uranium mines, strategic sites in the militaryindustrial complex and electrical power stations; a
drop in trade; or an uncontrollable surge of migrants,
in particular of refugees. It matters little if these
challenges are over-estimated: rumours and fears
are part and parcel of decision-making processes.
Even though Russia has no border with Central
Asia other than that with Kazakhstan, and thus no
territorial contiguity with the four other states,
the securing of the southern borders of Central
Asia is seen in Moscow as a question of domestic
security, and is done not out of “imperialism”, but
out of pragmatism. The 7,000 kilometres of RussoKazakh border, running through the heart of the
steppes, are practically impossible to secure, and
require better monitoring of clandestine flows
downstream. Central Asia is therefore viewed
by Russia as a buffer zone with a “south” that is
increasingly subject to strategic uncertainty and
non-traditional threats.
To address these challenges Russia presents itself as
a reliable partner for the Central Asian governments,
ready to collaborate with all of them, even Tashkent
and Ashgabat, when they ask for it. Moscow views
the security of Central Asia as above all pertaining
to military or strategic questions, and prioritises
a traditional concept of hard security. The main
Russian-Central Asian multilateral framework, the
Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO),
makes provisions for the sale of military materiel to
member countries at Russian domestic market prices,
and has revived cooperation between the Russian
and Central Asian military-industrial complexes.
Combined military exercises are carried out annually
in one of the member countries, simulating terrorist
attacks (called Rubezh) or anti-narcotics operations
(Kanal).6 The Collective Rapid Deployment Force
(CRDF) for Central Asia, comprising about 4,000
troops made up of Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Russian and
Tajik units is the only trained armed forces capable
of intervening in real time. On the bilateral level,
Russia also provides defence equipment including
helicopters, planes, spare parts and weapons to the
states of Central Asia, as well as personnel training to
the majority of soldiers and officers of Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, and a common air defence
system. Moscow has military bases in Kyrgyzstan
and Tajikistan, comprising a number of sites, as well
as a radar station and firing ranges in Kazakhstan.7
But these hard security elements are of no help
to Moscow or the Central Asian states in their
preparations to counter non-traditional threats.
Mechanisms used for soft security or to combat non6
A. Frost, “The Collective Security Treaty Organisation, the Shanghai
Cooperation Organisation, and Russia’s Strategic Goals in Central
Asia”, The China and Eurasia Forum Quarterly, vol. 7, no. 3, 2009, pp.
83-102.
7
S. Peyrouse, “Russia-Central Asia: Advances and Shortcomings of the
Military Partnership”, in S. Blank (ed.), Central Asian Security Trends:
Views from Europe and Russia (Carlisle: Strategic Studies Institute,
U.S. Army War College, 2011), pp. 1-34.
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
conventional threats lack regional coordination,
since they are considered by the Central Asian
regimes to be at the core of state sovereignty.
They are also ineffective due to the high level of
corruption of local law enforcement agencies.
Russian discourse is becoming more focused on
non-traditional threats, mainly Islamic terrorism
and narco-trafficking. Here again, Moscow aims to
reinforce the reaction capabilities of the Central
Asian governments (providing aid for intelligence
information, selling specialised material and
offering training with the Russian FSB), and to
establish a joint narrative on collective threats,
one in which the Central Asian governments can be
presented as the victims.
Even if the Kremlin does not officially endorse
interference in the internal affairs of Central
Asia, Russian experts are becoming more and
more aware of the fact that the absence of
development prospects in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan
and Uzbekistan creates insecurity, and that the
lack of preparation for political change may have
a destabilising impact. In Moscow, some officials
are discretely starting to encourage the Central
Asian governments to undertake reforms for
fear that Egyptian- or Tunisian-type situations may
occur because of the potential “cocktail” of political
repressions, social and economic depression and the
‘securitisation’ of national resources by a shrinking
elite. Such sentiments were expressed by the Russian
Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, Grigory Karasin,
at a hearing devoted to the problems of Central
Asia at the Duma in April 2011,8 although there
is not a consensus among Russian experts on this
parallel with the Arab Spring. Moreover, the return
of Vladimir Putin to the presidency in May 2012 and
the undermining of his legitimacy among the public,
which has given rise to the largest demonstrations
the country has seen since the fall of the USSR,
is confirmation that the region will not remain
unaffected by Russian domestic transformations.
1.3. Development
The economy ranks only as a secondary driver of
Russian influence. In 2010, trade between Russia
and Central Asia rose to nearly €17 billion, placing
Moscow third behind China and the European Union,
8
“Stranam Tsentral’noi Azii nuzhny reformy, chtoby izbezhat’ povtoreniia sobytii v Severnoi Afrike” [Reforms in Central Asian countries are required in order to avoid a repeat of the events in North
Africa], News.gazeta.ru, 13 April 2011, http://news.gazeta.kz/art.
asp?aid=338679.
9
although it is still the leading importer/exporter to
some of the states.9 Control over the export routes for
hydrocarbons dominates Russian regional strategies,
but trade with Central Asia also involves other important industries: uranium, electricity, hydroelectricity,
telecommunications, railways, the military-industrial complex and some agribusiness sectors. Therefore,
Russia remains a dominant economic actor in mineral
resources, which are important for the heavy industry
sector and infrastructure – old Soviet specialisations
– but is a relatively limited and uncompetitive actor
in terms of small- and mid-size companies and new
technologies.
Moscow’s strategy today is to update the Soviet legacy
by promoting an integrated space with some of the
republics. Transport, electricity and communications
are areas deemed to be “integrating” factors
par excellence, and may slow down the growing
economic dissociation between Russia and Central
Asia created by Chinese pressure.10 Since 2010,
the Russia-Belarus-Kazakhstan Customs Union has
enabled Russia to maintain common dynamics. In
July 2011 these three member countries abolished
all customs borders, and in January 2012 created a
common market of over 160 million people. Putin’s
statements, in October 2011, in favour of creating
a new Eurasian Union have confirmed the political
message of regional integration. For the first time,
the Kremlin is openly considering the idea of creating
a few joint, supranational mechanisms in specific
areas – mainly the economic and financial sectors,
but also potentially the strategic sector – that would
guarantee an integrative dynamic between Russia
and some of its closest CIS neighbours; Kazakhstan,
Belarus, potentially Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, and
maybe Armenia.11
Moscow’s investments in the Central Asian
economies can be explained by the logic of strategic
security (hydrocarbons, uranium), of common
space (electricity, transport), or classic rationales of
profit-making (communications and construction).
9
EU statistics, http://ec.europa.eu/trade/creating-opportunities/bilateral-relations/countries-and-regions/ (accessed 22 October 2011).
10
On this topic see: publications by the Research Centre of the Eurasian
Development Bank; E. Vinokurov (ed.), Obshchii elektroenergicheskii
rynok SNG [A CIS common electric market] (Astana: EABD, 2008);
E. Vinokurov (ed.), Mezhdunarodnye transportnye korridory EvrAsES [International transport corridors in the Eurasian Economic Community] (Astana: EABD, 2009); and the journal Evraziiskaia ekonomicheskaia integratsiia.
11
M. Laruelle, “Putin Uses Symbols of Soviet Power to Announce Idea of
Eurasian Union”, Eurasia Daily Monitor 8, no. 195, 24 October 2011.
10
Russia was, for a long time, the only member of
the G8 whose laws and government regulations
did not include the concept of official development
assistance (ODA). Until recently its aid development
was limited to writing off debts under loans lent
to the CIS countries within the framework of the
Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative, or to
offering humanitarian aid on a bilateral basis.
Since 2004, Moscow has been trying to systematise
its aid development strategy and to comply with
international norms, mainly for promoting its soft
power prestige. It formulated a first Participation
in International Development Assistance Concept
in 2007,12 and since 2010 has been working on
a national strategy for development policy. The
responsibility for development aid is dispersed
among different groups, but from 2012 will be held
by a specialised agency affiliated to the Ministry of
Finance. In 2010 Russia’s aid commitments reached
approximately $500 million. This aid is distributed
almost exclusively via international organisations
(the World Bank and UN agencies) and does not
involve NGOs, although sometimes the aid given
to a country contains an open political agenda.13 In
Central Asia, Russian aid is almost entirely allocated
to Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan in the form of debt
reduction, foodstuffs, aid for agriculture and relief
aid after natural catastrophes, though this is often
in exchange for an acceptance of continued Russian
military presence. Moscow plans to systematise
this Near Abroad development aid strategy with a
CIS Assistance and Partnership Programme and an
Anti-Crisis Fund as part of the Eurasian Economic
Community..14
These forms of aid nonetheless remain quite modest. Russia’s lack of interest in Central Asia’s development can be explained by three factors. First of
all, in contrast to the Chinese economy, the Russian
economy has no imperative need to find new markets to maintain its own dynamism. Central Asia is
not crucial on the economic level except in terms of
the transit rights it draws from hydrocarbons. The
Russian economy needs partnerships with more developed economies (Europe in particular) in order to
12
“Russia’s Participation in International Development Assistance Concept”, approved by the Russian president on 14 June 2007, http://www.
minfin.ru/common/img/uploaded/library/2007/06/concept_eng.pdf.
13
Nicaragua and Nauru for instance received Russian aid after they
recognised the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
14
M. Kaczmarski, and A. Wierzbowska-Miazga, “Russia’s development
assistance”, OSW Papers, 10 November 2011, http://www.osw.waw.pl/
en/publikacje/osw-commentary/2011-10-10/russias-developmentassistance.
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
acquire the technologies and know-how it is lacking,
rather than investing in less developed economies or
in economies that are too similar to its own such as
those of Central Asia. Secondly, the Kremlin believes
that the maintenance of open borders with the CIS
promotes labour migrations flows from Central Asia,
and therefore that Russia already offers a considerable safety release valve for the social and economic
tensions of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
The prevailing idea in Moscow is that the migrants
“cost” Russia more than they bring in, and that it
already indirectly aids the development of Central
Asia, in particular via remittances.15 Thirdly, the belief of having “given” enough to develop that region
during the Soviet period allows the Russian elite to
argue that the local regimes, now independent, are
themselves responsible for their difficult situation.
This view is, however, a short-sighted one, as the
destabilisation of Central Asia would also have consequences for the domestic situation in Russia.
2. The silent merchant: China
2.1. Long term interests
China’s key foreign policy strategies are driven
by factors far removed from Central Asia; instead
Beijing is focused on the relationship with the
United States, regional integration in Asia, partnership with Japan and the European Union, as well as
improving relations with India.16 In this foreign policy framework their post-Soviet neighbours occupy
a relatively minor place. When the Soviet Union disappeared, China’s primary objective was to maintain stability at its north and north-west borders
by addressing the issue of its territorial boundaries
with Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan,
and seeking confirmation that these countries
would respect the “One China” discourse. Yet, in the
Chinese perception of its environment, Central Asia
is not only a part of the post-Soviet world, but also
a part of a Muslim world with which Beijing is increasingly hoping to build a privileged partnership.
Central Asia is thus part of China’s strategy for consolidating its long-standing alliance with Pakistan,
15
O. Troitskaia, “Kolichestvo vmesto kachestva. Pochemu immigratsiia
neset Rossii bol’she problem, chem vozmozhnostei” [Quantity instead
of quality. Why immigration means more problem than possibilities
for Russia], Russia in Global Affairs, 22 October 2011, http://www.
globalaffairs.ru/number/Kolichestvo-vmesto-kachestva-15355.
16
B. Gill, Rising Star. China’s New Security Diplomacy (Washington,
D.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2007); Hongyi Lai, The Domestic
Sources of China’s Foreign Policy: Regimes, Leadership, Priorities and
Process (London: Routledge, 2010).
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
and of building a long-term partnership with Iran,
Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan.17 Central Asia is also
a space that embodies the new relationship between China and India, comprising both patterns of
competition and cooperation.18
Top 4 Chinese interests in Central Asia
1.
Stopping Central Asia from becoming a base for
Uyghur activism.
2.
Avoiding Central Asia becoming a destabilising
force that commits China to increasing involvement
in security matters outside its borders.
3.
Controlling a part of Central Asia’s hydrocarbons
and other raw materials and assets.
4.
Integrating Central Asia into the Chinese market’s
global strategy by opening up to the north and west.
Central Asia is unique to Beijing in terms of its direct relationship to domestic issues. China’s proximity with the region, though an asset in some perspectives, simultaneously involves numerous challenges: its ethnic contiguity with the Uyghur world
is perceived more as a danger than as an opportunity.19 The Chinese stance is first and foremost defensive, avoiding Central Asia becoming a place for exporting the Uyghur conflict and interfering directly
in China’s domestic management of this issue. At a
second degree, Beijing is also in a defensive position in terms of the security of Central Asia. A fragile
Afghanistan and a destabilised Pakistan creates an
already negative regional environment for China,
and so Central Asia’s stability is a priority, again
at the least possible cost. Finally, Central Asia has
come to position itself on the Chinese radar as a partial solution to two concerns. First, to secure continental energy supplies that are not subject to global
geopolitical complications; the 2011 gas agreement
with Turkmenistan – that will supply 65 billion cu17
G. Kemp, The East Moves West. India, China, and Asia’s Growing
Presence in the Middle East (Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution
Press, 2010).
18
See M. Laruelle, J.-F. Huchet, S. Peyrouse and B. Balci (eds.), China
and India in Central Asia. A new “Great Game”? (New York: Palgrave
Macmillan, 2010).
19
C. Mackerras, and M. Clarke (eds.), China, Xinjiang and Central Asia:
History, transition and crossborder interaction into the 21st century
(New York: Routledge, 2009).
11
bic meters a year – will cover a large part of China’s
gas needs. And secondly, to help China appear as a
peaceful rising power able to play the multilateralism card, and to build a specific partnership, one
that is economically-based, with the Muslim world.
However, even if energy and multilateralism remain important components of Chinese international positioning, Beijing’s interest in Central Asia
will still be primarily driven by domestic stability in Xinjiang, good neighbourly relations with
local governments, and the transformation of
Xinjiang and Central Asia into areas of transit for
the conquest of new markets.20 Central Asia is thus
paradoxically fundamental in terms of domestic
stability, because of the Uyghur issue, and marginal
to the preoccupations of Chinese foreign policy as
a whole. It is not related to Japan, North Korea or
Taiwan, since the Central Asian governments have
not sought to challenge the “One China” policy. Even
if the region is partly associated with relations with
the United States, mainly due to the U.S. military base
in Kyrgyzstan, it remains a trivial problem compared
to the issues of trade, currency and human rights
that plague day-to-day U.S.-China relations.
In contrast to Russia and Europe, the Chinese strategy is more cohesive. The influence of its private
actors is minimal and “civil society”, while vibrant
on domestic issues, is not involved on Central Asiarelated issues. This does not imply, however, a uniformity of opinion among the elites: the security
objectives of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) do
sometimes come into contradiction with the preoccupations or modalities of action of the civil elites
of the Party and the state. If Chinese activism in
Central Asia today appears to be dominated by economic questions – China is the region’s largest trading partner – this is because security questions are
viewed as either directly controlled by Beijing (this
is the case on the Uyghur question), or as dictated
in tandem with Russia (internal stability). However,
the Chinese elite are concerned about Moscow’s lack
of security capabilities in the region should significant instability arise.
2.2. Security
Initially China’s main priority in terms of security
was to consolidate its borders and put an end to the
conflicts concerning their demarcation. Between
20
M. Laruelle, and S. Peyrouse, The Chinese Factor in Central Asia: Domestic Order and Social Change (London-New York: Hurst-Columbia
University Press, 2012).
12
1994 and 2002, Beijing signed border demarcation
treaties with Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan,
and today the question is deemed to have been
resolved, even if the issue of cross-border river
management with Kazakhstan still remains open.21
The second security objective was to manage Central
Asia’s Uyghur diaspora of about 300,000 people.
The issue has today been brought under control, all
of the autonomist Uyghur associations have been
dismantled, the Central Asian governments are in
control of their own Uyghur minorities, and the
bilateral friendship declarations signed between
the Central Asian states and China all include
provisions for the common struggle against
separatism, and sometimes for procedures to expel
Uyghur dissidents to China.22
The symbol of Chinese security involvement in
Central Asia is obviously the Shanghai Cooperation
Organisation (SCO). Once the SCO’s original aims
of demilitarising the Sino-Soviet border zones and
of facilitating their delimitation were attained,
it set itself the goal of forging a common struggle
against the so-called “three evils” (san gu shili) of
fundamentalism, extremism and secessionism.23
The SCO has helped to ease long-standing tensions
between the Russian and Chinese worlds, to put in
place cooperative mechanisms for former Soviet
states to learn about their Chinese neighbour,
and to establish a collective discourse on the
common threats they face, one based on China’s
own security terminology. Now that this threshold
of development and institutionalisation has been
reached, the organisation faces new challenges.
Since 2008, the SCO seems to have entered a growth
crisis. It has not defined any positive long-term
goals; has no well-defined priorities; and refuses to
discuss divergences in its members’ priorities.24 It
has, in particular, failed to coordinate joint activities
against drug-trafficking, or to become a forum for
discussion on the water issue despite such calls from
21
In the framework of the “Far West” development programme, Beijing
has increased its withdrawal of water upstream from the Ili and the
Irtysh, thus reducing the water reserves available to Kazakhstan.
22
A. Cooley, Great Games, Local Rules: The New Great Power Contest
for Central Asia (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012).
23
Also called the three extremisms (sange jiduanzhuyi) or the “Shanghai
spirit”. See, for example, M. Oresman, “Catching the Shanghai Spirit”,
Journal of Social Sciences (Shanghai), no. 12, December 2003, republished at http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2004/05/01/catching_the_shanghai_spirit.
24
A. Cooley, “The Stagnation of the SCO. Competing Agendas and
Divergent Interests in Central Asia”, PONARS Memo no. 85, September 2009.
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
Bishkek, Dushanbe and Tashkent. The obsession
with consensus and for maintaining the status quo
has hampered the SCO’s effectiveness and risks
delegitimising it in the future.
The gap between the SCO’s narrative about the fight
against non-traditional threats and its mechanisms
that enable collective, or at least concerted action, is
immense. As it was not designed to be a supranational organisation, since this would imply the reduced
sovereignty of its members, the SCO does not have
a defined military structure like the CSTO. It is neither a military defence alliance like NATO, nor does
it seek to create multilateral military or police units.
Despite the establishment of an anti-terrorist centre in Tashkent in 2004 – the Regional Anti-Terrorist
Structure (RATS), designed to develop common approaches to combat terrorist movements – any multilateral security dynamic remains embryonic.25 The
SCO does not provide any military guarantees in cases
of domestic crisis. Nor does it offer the structure of a
“rapid intervention force”, or a collective troop force
like that of the Ministry of Emergency Situations in
Russia, which would make it possible to intervene
in natural disaster situations or a refugee crisis. It
has never managed to react to large-scale crises in
any one of its member states. Its silence during the
Kyrgyz events of 2010 confirmed this, as does its incapacity to offer anything collective to a state that is
as strategic as Afghanistan, albeit a non-member. Its
greatest successes are probably the extradition treaty
between member states and the formation of a ‘black
list’, which includes about one thousand people and
forty organisations considered as ‘terrorists’.26 The
SCO seems therefore primarily to be a reflection of
Chinese willingness to support a so-called “healthy
Central Asian order”, free of the “three evils” and devoid of pro-Western forces that might act to destabilise China.
For the time being, Chinese bilateral military
presence in Central Asia is also limited, unable
to rival Russia’s major role. Its aid is restricted to
electronic material, automobiles and textiles, and
includes almost no military hardware sales. However,
Astana has expressed its intention to obtain military
equipment from the PLA and hopes to take advantage
of free transfers of decommissioned military assets
when the Chinese army engages in modernising
25
A.J.K. Bailes, P. Dunay, P. Guang, and M. Troitskiy, “The Shanghai
Cooperation Organisation”, SIPRI Policy Paper no. 17, May 2007.
26
More in A. Cooley, Great Games, Local Rules: The New Great Power
Contest for Central Asia.
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
13
Chinese imports, exports and total trade with Central Asian states in 2010 in millions of Euros1
Kazakhstan
Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Turkmenistan
Uzbekistan
1
Imports from China
7,724.3 (34.1%)
3,391.2 (62.7%)
180.6 (9%)
434.6 (10.2%)
978.9 (15.2%)
Rank
1
1
4
4
4
Exports to China
7,579.7 (21.1%)
48 (5.7%)
335.5 (37.3%)
722.4 (28.4%)
889.7 (20.5%)
2.3. Development
China has formulated a relatively well-structured
narrative on the security-development nexus,
originally based on its analysis of its domestic situation, and subsequently transcribed onto
foreign policy. Ever since the 17th Congress of
the Chinese Communist Party in 2007, Hu Jintao has
promulgated the concept of a “harmonious society”
(hexie shehui), which is to say one in which development and security are linked together. Due to the
country’s extraordinary boom Chinese society today
appears highly divided, involving contradictory interests and a sharp rise in economic and cultural disparities between peasants, workers, the middle-classes
and the elites, but also between the maritime and
continental regions. The need for a better distribution of wealth is therefore considered by the Chinese
Communist Party (CCP) as a solution to a sizeable
political liability that might imperil the regime’s stability and the state’s long-term interests. As far as
the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) is
concerned, Beijing, taking its “harmonious society”
28
Total trade
15,304.1 (26.1%)
3,439.3 (55%)
516.1 (17.8%)
1,157.1 (17%)
1,868.6 (17.3%)
Rank
2
1
2
2
2
Table based on information from 2011 European Commission statistics, http://ec.europa.eu/trade/creating-opportunities/bilateral-relations/
countries-and-regions/ (accessed 22 October 2011).
its equipment.27 Finally, aid in the form of training
is, while modest, slowly developing. Exchanges
have been organised to train military cadres, but
cultural differences, the language barrier and the
cautious attitude of the Central Asians hinders
prospects. Courses for Central Asian officers in
Chinese military academies are taught in Russian,
as Chinese instructors are unable to speak Central
Asian languages or Central Asian officers, Chinese.
For the Central Asian governments, materiel and
training from the PLA is a still theoretical balance to
the supplies of outdated Soviet equipment, but for
the time being Chinese aid remains focused on nonmilitary support and involves little training.28
27
Rank
2
4
1
1
2
S. Peyrouse, “Sino-Kazakh Relations: A Nascent Strategic Partnership”,
China Brief, vol. 8, no. 21, 2008, pp. 11-15.
S. Peyrouse, “Military Cooperation between China and Central Asia:
Breakthrough, Limits, and Prospects”, China Brief, 5 March 2010.
principle as a point of departure, believes that the
political and ethnic tensions among the Uyghurs will
attenuate with economic development and their integration into overall Chinese dynamism. Beijing has
therefore adopted a carrot-and-stick policy. The carrot is the economic development of Xinjiang ($300
billion of planned investments by 2015); while the
stick is the willingness to eliminate any elements the
Chinese authorities deem to be potentially subversive. However, ethnic riots in 2008, 2009 and 2011
confirmed the inadequacy of the Chinese strategy.
Investing massively in the local economy and infrastructures is not enough to defuse secessionist tensions and identity conflicts.29
This narrative also has an external component.
Under Hu Jintao, the CCP’s aim has been to establish China unambiguously as one of the leaders of
a so-called multipolar world, increasingly confident
and keen to show it can undertake greater responsibilities in international affairs. This presumes
that it can speak as an equal with the major powers, develop cooperation with regional organisations and international donors, as well as foster
relations with developing countries by stressing
common prosperity. Henceforth, China aims to
be a “responsible stakeholder”; an approach that
it has tried to stress in its dealings with Africa,
Latin America and Central Asia, through a rhetoric
of mutual non-aggression, mutual non-interference
in each other’s internal affairs, mutual benefit and
peaceful coexistence, but also via mechanisms of
development aid.30 China has no official definition
or central institution for its development aid. In of29
S. Peyrouse, “Security and Islam in Asia: Lessons from China’s Uyghur
minority”, FRIDE Policy Brief, no. 87, July 2011, http://www.fride.org/
publication/932/security-and-islam-in-asia:-lessons-from-china’suyghur-minority.
30
J.M. Blanchard, “Harmonious World and China’s Foreign Economic
Policy: Features, Implications, and Challenges”, Journal of Chinese
Political Science, vol. 13, no. 2, 2008, pp. 165-192.
14
ficial rhetoric, however, it does not use this term
and prefers to talk about “cooperation” between the
developing countries.31 It wants to be an alternative to the major international donors, even though
Beijing also participates financially in the Asian
Development Bank, in a few of the UNDP’s African
programmes, and, as regards Central Asia, has also
invested in the CAREC programme.
In the case of Central Asia, this translates into a
“good neighbourhood” principle centred on massive
involvement in the construction and upgrading
of extraction infrastructures (the Caspian SeaXinjiang pipeline for Kazakh oil, the Sino-Central
Asian gas pipeline, the massive purchase of Kazakh
uranium, and a growing interest in rare minerals
in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan), transport facilities
(upgrading roads, construction of tunnels and
bridges in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, building
turnkey hydroelectric stations, and delivery of
railway material) and communications (huge
investments in mobile telephony, internet networks,
optic fibres, etc.). China has become, in a mere
decade, the main trading partner of Central Asia,
with €23 billion in trade in 2010.32 Beijing sees
poverty as the major matrix of the destabilisations
in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, and the largest share
of its aid is directed to those two countries. In 2004,
it announced a loan of $900 million to Central Asia,
most of which was given to Dushanbe; and in 2009,
China extended $10 billion to Kazakhstan, half of
the sum being made up of a loan from the ExportImport Bank of China (Eximbank) to its counterpart,
the Development Bank of Kazakhstan.33
Chinese aid for development is granted either by
subsidies, which are generally paid in kind through
delivery of goods and material in order to reduce
the risks of corruption, or by preferential or concessional credit.34 Though the money from loans
is, on paper, granted to the beneficiary country, it
is generally transferred to the company or enterprise in charge of the project, which makes it possi31
N. Kassenova, Aide au développement : la percée chinoise au Tadjikistan et au Kirghizstan (Paris: IFRI, Series Russie. NEI. Vision, no. 36,
2009), p. 8.
32
2011 European Commission’s statistics, http://ec.europa.eu/trade/
creating-opportunities/bilateral-relations/countries-and-regions/ (accessed 22 October 2011).
33
“China loans 10 bln dollars to Kazakhstan”, Energy Daily, 17 April
2009, http://www.energy-daily.com/reports/China_loans_10_bln_
dlrs_to_Kazakhstan_state_media_999.html.
34
N. Kassenova, Aide au développement : la percée chinoise au Tadjikistan et au Kirghizstan, p. 10.
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
ble to keep the money within the Chinese system.35
China’s aid has seen successes for a number of reasons: it is not conditional, as it is not dependent
upon reforms of any kind; loans are offered at very
advantageous rates; and the “turn-key” services
proposed by Chinese companies are inexpensive.
However, Chinese aid does not involve competencebuilding and does not help Central Asian economies
to become autonomous actors in their own development. On the contrary, it exacerbates their economic dependency on Chinese aid and products.
This aid is therefore not devoid of financial and
strategic interests. China is trying to create new
export markets for its products; landing contracts
for its companies, which are the main benefactors
of its bank loans; guaranteeing itself new energy
supplies; and making Central Asian governments its
“debtors” or even its “vassals”.
3. The hesitant vicar: The European Union
3.1. Long term interests
More than any other actor Europe presents a
multifaceted face, however it is one that is not
devoid of contradictions. The European Union itself
is a complex structure with several heads – the
Commission, Council and Parliament – and with a
number of representatives – the Council President,
the presiding member state, the President of the
Commission, and the High Representative for
Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, who is part of
both the Commission and the Council. Europe is
also represented by its member states, some of
whom are particularly active in Central Asia and
often more visible than the EU. Europe may also
be embodied by non-member states (Switzerland,
Norway) and transatlantic institutions (OSCE,
NATO); and it is a stakeholder in international
organisations, especially those linked to the UN
(the EU for instance finances the BOMCA project,
though it is implemented by the UNDP), and
through international donors. Lastly, the European
approach is also reflected by non-state actors and
private actors, whether companies or civil society.
In this paper we will focus mainly on the EU.
At the beginning of the 1990s, the European Union
was managing a full agenda: German reunification;
the introduction of the Schengen agreement; the
wars in Yugoslavia; preparing the Central European
35
Ibid, p. 11.
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
states for membership; and building new relations
with Moscow. In this context, Central Asia did not
actor in any way as a priority.36 With the slow but
steady growth of EU external policies, Central Asia
gradually appeared on the radar. In 2007, under the
German EU Council Presidency the “Strategy for a
New Partnership with Central Asia” was established
with the intention of building relations and giving
impetus to cooperation with Central Asia. The ambition of the initiative signalled a palpable evolution in European perceptions to look further beyond
Europe’s eastern borders.37 Despite these advances
the strategy for Central Asia remains difficult to compare with European commitments made as a part of
the Eastern Partnership. The latter was designed to
complement the Union for the Mediterranean by providing an institutionalised forum for discussing visa
liberalisation, free trade and Association Agreements
with six East European and South Caucasus neighbours, while avoiding the controversial topic of
membership. Although Kazakhstan’s accession to the
Eastern Partnership has been discussed informally,
particularly in 2010 when the country held the chairmanship of the OSCE, Central Asia is not envisaged to
be a part of this initiative and EU involvement in the
region is destined to remain limited.
Top 4 European Union interests in Central Asia
1. Helping to secure and stabilise Central Asia.
2. Accessing Central Asian hydrocarbons.
3. Promotion of democratic values and human rights.
4. Meeting internationally agreed development criteria.
While the EU Strategy for Central Asia outlines
seven priorities,38 its main interests lie foremost
in the stability of the region and countering negative spill-over effects from Afghanistan, as well as
in securing energy resources (potential gas imports
from Turkmenistan and oil from Kazakhstan). At
the same time the EU tries to place an emphasis on
democratic values and human rights, which is challenging considering the authoritarian nature of the
Central Asian regimes. In practice, these objectives
36
A. Warkotsch (ed.), The European Union and Central Asia (Abingdon: Routledge, 2011).
37
N. Melvin and J. Boonstra, “The EU Strategy for Central Asia @ Year
One”, EUCAM Policy Brief, no. 1, October 2008.
38
Human rights, the rule of law, good governance and democratisation;
youth and education; economic development, trade and investment;
strengthening energy and transport links; environmental sustainability and water; combating common threats and challenges; and intercultural dialogue.
15
have competing logics. The European desire to diversify gas export routes in order to reduce its dependence on Russia has led to a relaxation of EU human rights pressure on Turkmenistan. The potential for the country to participate in the Southern
Corridor, even at a modest 10 billion cubic metres
per year, has led to some human rights and rule of
law criticisms being overlooked.
Meanwhile, the Central Asian governments that
participate in the Northern Distribution Network,
with Uzbekistan at its core, want to be rewarded
for their “support” to the Western campaign in
Afghanistan. When faced with NATO, the EU has not
succeeded in arguing its case and has instead found
itself somewhat paralysed by security priorities,
which is all the more paradoxical considering
that the domestic stability of the Central Asian
states partly depends on a secure Afghanistan.
Furthermore, the EU’s development investment
is limited; it is spread thinly over the region and is
having little effect due to the corrupt nature of the
Central Asian ruling classes. Taken together, the
EU’s objectives seek to link energy, security, values
and development goals and interests, though not in a
structural or achievable manner.
3.2. Security
The EU’s role as a hard security actor on the international scene is limited, and most European countries place their trust in NATO to guarantee their security on a global level. While the Common Security
and Defence Policy (CSDP) currently runs a host of
smaller civilian and military missions around the
world, chances are minimal that a substantial new
CSDP will be deployed any time soon. The reasons
for this can be attributed to disagreements between
member states on the development of CSDP structures, the awkward relationship between the EU
and NATO caused by a large overlapping membership and above all to defence cuts around Europe.
In Central Asia, EU mechanisms barely relate to
hard security and the soft security initiatives are
too dispersed to have a serious impact. Moreover,
security assistance is often associated with institutions other than the EU. The OSCE, for instance, has
a border guard training programme in Central Asia,
while NATO hasits own association strategies, via
the Partnership for Peace (PfP) programme, and
an Individual Partnership Action Plan (IPAP) for
Kazakhstan. Member states are also engaged in bilateral programmes (including aid for police training).
16
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
The EU’s imports, exports and total trade with Central Asian states in 2010 in millions of Euros1
Kazakhstan
Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Turkmenistan
Uzbekistan
1
Imports from the EU
5,389.2 (23.8%)
223.5 (4.1%)
197.4 (9.8%)
760.4 (17.9%)
1,321.5 (20.5%)
Rank
2
4
3
2
2
Exports to the EU
13,601.1 (37.8%)
14.3 (1.7%)
32.9 (3.7%)
332.7 (13.1%)
356.1 (8.2%)
Rank
1
8
6
2
5
Total trade
18,990.3 (32.4%)
237.8 (3.8%)
230.3 (7.9%)
1,093.1 (16.1%)
1,677.6 (15.6%)
Rank
1
5
5
3
3
Table based on information from 2011 European Commission statistics, http://ec.europa.eu/trade/creating-opportunities/bilateral-relations/countries-and-regions/ (accessed 22 October 2011).
Owing to both the multiplicity of European actors
and the lack of visibility of some EU mechanisms,
no European “grand narrative” on Central Asian security exists to complement that of Russia, China
or the United States.39 Alongside the many indirect
programmes that touch upon security it is the EU
Special Representative, Pierre Morel, who has the
most prominent security portfolio of the European
Union in Central Asia, and helps to increase visibility
in the region as well as signal urgent security threats.
In Central Asia the EU’s focus lies primarily in
the sphere of soft security or human security.
Development assistance to Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan
is largely underpinned by stability and security
concerns, for instance in the fields of poverty
reduction and migration. EU assistance programmes
‒ though mostly limited in size but many in number ‒
seek to build more inclusive societies that can resist
security threats such as ethnic violence, internal
instability and interstate tensions. In this sense the
EU’s regional programmes are designed to bring
the five countries – that have weak or even strained
relationships with each other – to the table in order
to foster cooperation on water management or rule
of law reform.
The June 2010 Joint EU Council and Commission
Implementation Report of the EU Strategy for Central
Asia recognises the deficiencies of the 2007 Strategy
in terms of security, and called for reinforced efforts in “security broadly speaking”.40 Its conclusion
reads: “It will be necessary to expand the concept of
security to include major international and regional
challenges such as human security, the combating of
drug trafficking and trafficking in human beings, pre39
S. Peyrouse, “Human Security in Central Asia. Can the EU help out?”,
EUCAM Policy Brief, no. 21, 2011.
40
The Joint EU Council and Commission Implementation Report of the
EU Strategy for Central Asia, 28 June 2010, p. 6.
cursors, nuclear and radioactive materials, uranium
tailings, border management, bio-safety, bio-security, and the combating of terrorism and prevention of
radicalisation and extremism, including via a continued emphasis on poverty alleviation. Combating
corruption is an important element in countering
many of these security challenges”.41 Meanwhile
the European Parliament developed its own position on the implementation of the EU Strategy. The
December 2011 report on this matter emphasises a
connection between EU development policy, democratic values and security. It “underlines the need
to explain and promote the EU concept of security
and stability in the event that it differs from theirs
(Central Asians)” and it “recognises that the denial
of basic rights and opportunities that result from the
absence of democracy and the rule of law can lead to
situations of insecurity”.42
EU officials have difficulty explaining to Central Asian
counterparts what their security objectives are and
how they plan to meet them. The EU’s security approach to the region remains vague and all-encompassing. Debates within EU institutions and between
member states need to produce a clearer concept. A
joint External Action Service and member states review process of the EU strategy this year (expected
to be finalised in June) should help clarify EU plans
and views on security. It will be a hard nut to crack
because the EU will need to broadcast a clearer message while remaining focused on a wide range of issues that fall within the development-security nexus.
The 2007 EU Strategy for Central Asia lists security among its goals, particularly in regards to border management, Afghanistan’s proximity and drug
41
Ibid, p. 26.
42
European parliament resolution of 15 December 2011 on the state of
implementation of the EU Strategy for Central Asia (2011/2008, INI),
http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?type=TA&language=E
N&reference=P7-TA-2011-0588.
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
trafficking. Among EU programmes for border
securitisation, the best known ‒ BOMCA (Border
Management in Central Asia Programme) and
CADAP (Central Asia Drug Action Programme), implemented by the UNDP ‒ focus on the upgrading
and/or building of border posts, on equipping them
with high-tech material, training border guards in
searching goods and people, detecting illicit substances, and on performing combined exercises
with neighbouring countries. Currently the BOMCA
programme is moving increasingly from providing hardware to know-how. In addition, both programmes are also designed, at least in theory, to
help improve cross-border trade.
European countries support several multilateral
initiatives, one example being the Central Asia
Border Security Initiative (CABSI), organised by
the Austrian Federal Ministry of the Interior with
support from the European Union, to provide a
platform for dialogue and discussion. The EU meets at
regular intervals with members of the international
donor community and agencies involved in border
security technical assistance, such as the UNDP,
OSCE, UNODC, IOM, Japan, the Russian Federation
and the United States.43 Another initiative, the
Central Asia Regional Information and Coordination
Centre (CARICC) for combating the illicit trafficking
of narcotics, psychotropic substances and their
recursors, is now operational and making plans to
establish links with Interpol. However, due to a lack
of independent evaluation, it is unclear if any of
these Western-led programmes have had a positive
impact, or if they are even sustainable.
One could argue that the EU’s border management
programme BOMCA should be turned into a CSDP
mission; at least the part that refers to the TajikAfghan border. This would make sense because
the CSDP has experience with border management
programmes (EUBAM in Moldova) and with border
monitoring (EUMM in Georgia). Such a mission,
deployed on the Tajik-Afghan border, would be
able to prepare for possible negative consequences
of NATO troop withdrawal from Afghanistan over
the coming years and fit nicely with EU activities
in Afghanistan on border control or the CSDP
police mission. Also a CSDP border mission might
establish greater pressure on Tajik political elites
to get serious about reform of border management
43
“Press Release: Central Asian Border Security Issues Discussed in Dushanbe”, BOMCA, 17 March 2011, http://www.bomca.eu/en/news/8.
html.
17
and maybe even spur some anti-corruption action.
But clearly the EU member states lack the political
will and the resources to think ahead and invest in
a region far away and of less interest than the EU’s
Eastern and Southern neighbourhoods. In the event
that interest or necessity rises to the level required
for the deployment of a CSDP mission, the EU would
first need to reach an agreement with Russia; and
Moscow is unlikely to be happy to see another CSDP
mission be deployed in what it sees as its backyard.
Another option for the EU would be to invest in the
OSCE and increase its capacity on border control,
management and training along the border with
Afghanistan. The advantage would be that such an
effort would be more inclusive as the U.S., Russia
and Tajikistan are all OSCE members. On top of this
the OSCE also has extensive experience with border programmes and is already active in this field
in Tajikistan through donor coordination efforts
and a Border Management Staff College. The OSCE
sometimes runs projects that are funded through
extra-budgetary means – in most cases paid for by
European countries – and the EU remains by far
the biggest contributor to the OSCE budget. But
this inclusiveness might also limit the OSCE’s scope
for increased engagement. Member states have not
been able to agree on any significant new missions
or on the involvement of the OSCE over the last decade, and many participating states have lost enthusiasm for it. The U.S. sees the organisation as a democracy promoter not a security mechanism, while
Russia and its partners resist OSCE human dimension programmes, and none take the OSCE serious
as a security forum and implementer of new largescale missions.
3.3. Development
With the Strategy, the EU made provisions for
doubling its aid to Central Asia between 2007-2013,
with a focus on three major objectives: stability and
security; the fight against poverty; and regional
cooperation between the states of Central Asia
themselves and with the EU in the domains of energy,
transport, higher education and the environment.
In contrast with the EU’s earlier programmes,
which had a similar approach for all five states, the
assistance now increasingly focuses on bilateral
relations in order to better target specific problems
in each state, with a clear focus on Kyrgyzstan
and Tajikistan as the poorest countries.44 This
44
More in J. Boonstra, M. Emerson (rapporteurs), N. Hasanova, M.
Laruelle and S. Peyrouse, Into Eurasia. Monitoring the EU’s Central
Asia Strategy (Brussels-Madrid: CEPS-FRIDE, 2010).
18
dissociation is appreciated locally and seen as proof
of growing EU pragmatism. The regional approach,
which receives a third of the budget, is reserved
for transnational matters including regional EU
initiatives on education, water management and rule
of law. In addition, EU assistance is often provided in
collaboration with other international bodies.
As with security, the EU is not the only European
actor active in Central Asia in terms of development.
It has coordinated activities with the European Bank
for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the
European Investment Bank (EIB) and with various
member state programmes, including: the Deutsche
Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit
(GIZ), the German Development Bank (KfW), the UK
Department for International Development (DFID),
and an increasing number of Finnish programmes. It
has also worked with non-EU member Switzerland
via the Swiss Cooperation Offices in Central Asia.
Between 1991 and 2006, the Technical Assistance to
the Commonwealth of Independent States (TACIS)
distributed more than €1.3 billion among various
sectors linked to the promotion of democracy and
pluralism, economic modernisation, regional cooperation, energy, and water as well as to struggles
against threats such as terrorism, drug trafficking and
human trafficking.45 With the Strategy of 2007, the EU
shifted its assistance to focus on poverty reduction
and sustainable development. It made public a general Regional Strategy Paper for assistance to Central
Asia over the period 2007-2013, and more detailed
Indicative Programmes which provide for around
€719 million to be spent in Central Asia by 2013.46
European aid has been restructured around the
Development Cooperation Instrument (DCI), which
merges various geographical instruments and issues.
It is therefore no longer specific to the post-Soviet
states as such and includes several institutional
tools that the Commission has at its disposal. Within
the framework of regional cooperation, the DCI
for Central Asia has defined four main objectives:
support for energy and transport networks and
integration into the world market; improvement on
45
N. Melvin (ed.), Engaging Central Asia. The European Union’s New
Strategy in the Heart of Eurasia (Brussels: Centre for European Policy
Studies, 2008).
46
Strategy for assistance to Central Asia 2007-2013 and indicative programme 2007-2010, http://europa.eu/legislation_summaries/external_relations/relations_with_third_countries/eastern_europe_and_
central_asia/r17106_en.htm.
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
environmental management, in particular water and
forests; border and migration management, as well as
the fight against organised crime; and the promotion
of educational exchanges. However, two-thirds of EU
aid is given to bilateral programmes that are mainly
focused on poverty reduction and, to a lesser extent,
on good governance and economic reform.47
Apart from the DCI, EU assistance is provided
through other instruments: The Instrument for
Stability (IfS) and the European Instrument for
Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR) plus thematic programmes such as Non-State Actors and Local
Authorities (NSA-LA) and Food Security Programme.
Whereas the global IfS instrument has not been particularly active in Central Asia, with the exception
of a few substantial activities in Kyrgyzstan in 2008
and 2010, the EIDHR and NSA-LA have supported
civil society projects in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and
Tajikistan. The EIDHR’s budget is also used to maintain the practice of organising civil society seminar in Central Asia. These ‘open events’ are generally connected to the ‘behind closed doors’ Human
Rights Dialogues with all five countries.
Today aid development is centred on Kyrgyzstan
and Tajikistan as low income economies.
International donors paid special attention to
Kyrgyzstan after the 2010 ethnic violence. In July
2010 international donors pledged $1.1 billion, of
which the EU promised to allocate close to €118
million in extra aid. Additionally Kyrgyzstan will
receive €30 million (half in loans and half in grants)
macro-financial assistance from the EU, currently
subject to the European Parliament’s consent. Both
countries receive the biggest chunk of DCI funds
compared to their neighbours, as well as assistance
through the Food Security Program (FSP) and
other mechanisms. The EU believes that social
and political stability in these two weak states can
best be bolstered by poverty reduction, improving
living standards and a focus on areas such as rural
development. A substantial part of the DCI funding
is provided through budget support. This practice
saves the EU substantial implementation costs and
is meant to foster increased responsibility and good
governance in both countries. On the downside,
reporting on the use of funds by recipients has so far
been weak, and the regimes remain highly corrupt
and to different extents non-democratic.
47
J. Boonstra and J. Hale, “EU Assistance to Central Asia: back to the
drawing board?”, EUCAM Working Paper, no. 8, 2010.
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
The three other states receive assistance through
regional programming, and less in the way of
bilateral assistance. In Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan
the EU feels it can do little about promoting reform
and there is concern that support will only bolster
the authoritarian regimes. Kazakhstan is likely to
be among the countries that will graduate from
low income to middle income status. This means
it will soon stop receiving DCI bilateral assistance.
Instruments that support civil society such as the
EIDHR apply to Kazakhstan but barely relate to
Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan where there are not
many independent civil society and human rights
organisations to support.
European development aid to Central Asia is a
complicated business with many actors involved and
even more priorities included. Next to traditional
views on aid there seems to be a stronger focus
on linking development to security and threats
of instability, however European donors have
difficulty in spending the few available funds wisely
in support of developing stable and well-run states
due to the authoritarian character of the region.
4. Divergences and overlapping interests
4.1. The EU and the Russia-China tandem:
The values factor
Russia and China do not share Europe’s view
on numerous international questions and have
criticised Western policies in Central Asia,
denouncing interference in internal affairs in the
name of human rights and democracy promotion.
On the international scene, China is increasingly
presenting itself as an alternative to the West (often
including Russia). China utilises a narrative in which
it presents itself as a developing country in order
to criticise the major established powers, and has
long refused to get involved in multilateral forums.
Russia, on the contrary, critical as it may be of the
United States and the EU, is much better integrated
at the international level, and part of all major
world institutions. In Central Asia these divergences
between Moscow’s and Beijing’s strategies are less
visible. Both give support to the Central Asian ruling
elites, despite the fact that Russian and Chinese
experts voice their concerns about the inability of
the governments to reform and modernise. The EU’s
point of view, which is that long-term state stability
is possible only with a certain level of political
diversity and realistic alternatives, is not shared by
19
the two major external actors nor put into practice
by Central Asian regimes.
In security thinking the European approach also
diverges from that of Russia and China. In contrast to
Russia the EU does not give priority to hard security,
and does not seek to engage the Central Asian states
in new strategic alliances besides having organised
two security conferences there in 2009 and 2010.
The EU has not put forward any proposals for
regional security structures that might compete
with the CSTO or the SCO, and believes this issue
should be addressed through NATO and the OSCE.
The multilateral and soft-security-based approach
of the China-led SCO seems closer to European
thinking, although in practice the EU is unable to
corroborate the SCO’s security narrative, which is
modelled on the Chinese concept of the “three evils”,
and which serves to justify the repressive policies
conducted in Xinjiang.
Another point of contrast with Russia is the fact that
Europe unambiguously emphasises the relationship
between long-term security and development.
Europe believes that a commitment to economic
development and social well-being is a major
element of international peace and of internal
stability. Russia does not hold a counter-narrative,
but neither does it consider its actions in Central
Asia in such terms. At first glance therefore, Europe
seems to share more similarities with the Chinese
discourse, insofar as it recognises that inequalities
in wealth and a lack of prospects directly fuel
political crises. However, the Chinese definition
of development is limited to a socio-economic
understanding of the term; the need for political
reform is not part of its official preoccupations.
In Central Asia, China’s “harmonious society”
policy provides unfailing support for corrupt
and authoritarian regimes, going against its own
development-security narrative.
Russia, China and the EU therefore have divergences
in the prioritisation of their interests in Central Asia,
as well as in their conceptions of the link between
security and development.
Russia
China
EU
Long-term interest
High
High
Low
Focus on security
High
Focus on development
Low
Medium Medium
High
High
20
4.2. The EU and Russia on security
and development
On questions of security, Russia shows greater
potential for cooperation with the EU than China.
Moscow is interested in cooperation and the Kremlin
has indicated time and again their dissatisfaction
with being marginalised from European security
issues – for example, Medvedev’s proposal for a new
security architecture for the whole of the continent
– and has tabled suggestions for cooperation to be
undertaken between the CSTO and NATO, for instance
in anti-drug operations in Afghanistan. Moreover, the
EU and Russia already share a history with the CSDP
mission in Chad (European Union Force Chad/CAR).
In the coming years, Russian policy will require the
growing involvement of other external actors in
Central Asia. The security management costs for the
region are high and Moscow no longer has the means
to go it alone. Its non-intervention during the Osh
events in June 2010 confirmed Russia’s reluctance
for direct military involvement.
The fight against drug trafficking has been at the
heart of Moscow’s security concerns ever since the
director of the Federal Agency against narco-traffic,
Viktor Ivanov, made it his warhorse. The traffic that
reaches Europe by and large passes through Russia
and then the Baltic area, and so any combat strategies
need to extend from the Afghan-Central Asian region
to Europe’s eastern border. During a conference at
the European Parliament Viktor Ivanov proposed
that the EU establish a joint agency to combat drug
production and trafficking in Afghanistan.48 The
Central Asia Regional Information and Coordination
Centre (CARICC), which already includes the five
states of Central Asia as well as Azerbaijan and
Russia, could become a platform for the exchange
of intelligence with European bodies, or indeed join
together, in one form or another, with the Central Asia
Border Security Initiative (CABSI). Issues that could
be discussed include sharing intelligence information
and joint drug-seizure operations, potentially also
partial coordination between the different agencies
training Central Asian border guards: CSTO, BOMCA
(UNDP/EU) and the OSCE. The EU could also develop
cooperation with the “anti-drug quartet” of Russia,
Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan. UNODC, in
which Moscow is becoming more and more involved,
plans, for instance, to train Central Asian and Afghan
officers jointly in Moscow and Ankara.
48
“Russia, EU need to set up joint anti-drug agency”, Voice of Russia, 29
June 2011, http://english.ruvr.ru/2011/06/29/52541692.html.
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
But there are also arguments against increased cooperation with Russia. First, the high level of corruption
and inefficiency of Russian law enforcement agencies
in fighting drug trafficking may call into question
European capabilities. Second, the Russian stance on
the fight against drug-trafficking is controversial. In
June 2011, the Russian Duma declared “total war” on
drugs and is in the process of preparing new, stricter
laws that would force addicts into treatment or jail
and would treat dealers “like serial killers”.49 It remains to be seen whether this forceful solution is
the right one, and whether the government will be
capable of enforcing it and of offering addicts a real
alternative. Third, Moscow remains quiet about the
involvement of top Central Asian officials in drug
trafficking. However, on this issue the EU is paradoxically also concerned about not harming its relations
with the local governments.
Fourth, Russia’s resistance to the Central Asian
Counter-narcotics Initiative (CACI) launched in
June 2011 by the U.S. Bureau of International
Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs could also
be problematic for Europe.50 Moscow has clearly
expressed its opposition to the State Department’s
initiative to establish a network of anti-drug centres
in each country of Central Asia, which it views, as does
China, as a way to maintain a concealed American
paramilitary presence.51 Here once again, the room
for common strategies seems limited.
Other areas for cooperation with Russia can also
be envisaged including education and migration.
The EU does not have the capabilities to meet the
demands of Central Asian students to come to
Europe. However, partnerships between Russian
and Central Asian universities on the one hand, and
between Russian and European universities on the
other, can serve to make specific Russian universities
mediators between the EU and Central Asia. Central
Asian students can be sent to Russia at a lower cost
and can undertake better quality studies there than
49
T. Parfitt, “Russia defies growing consensus with declaration of ‘total
war on drugs’”, The Guardian, 8 June 2011, http://www.guardian.
co.uk/world/2011/jun/08/russia-total-war-on-drugs.
50
R. Solash, “U.S. Promotes New Plan To Battle Drug Trade In Afghanistan, Central Asia”, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 19 July 2011,
http://www.rferl.org/content/us_promotes_new_plan_to_battle_
drug_trade_in_afghanistan_central_asia_and_russia/24270127.html
(accessed 8 December 2011).
51
R. Weitz, “Moscow, Central Asia perceive Afghan drugs as security
threat”, The Central Asia and Caucasus Analyst, 30 November 2011,
http://www.cacianalyst.org/?q=node/5674 (accessed 8 December
2011).
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
21
in their countries of origin. As far as work migration
flows are concerned, Russia is simultaneously a
destination and a stepping stone on the way to Europe.
Management policies concerning border flows and
the integration of migrants and their families present
a fundamental challenge for Europe as well as for
Russia. Common strategies are particularly necessary
as Moscow wants visas for Schengen countries to be
abolished, but without cancelling its free-circulation
agreements with the majority of the CIS countries.
In this area, which touches on border security but
equally on larger social stakes, Russian and European
approaches are probably complementary.
at the China University of Petroleum and the Xi’an
University of Oil and Gas) and agricultural training
(it has partnership agreements with the Agrarian
University of Almaty and that of Urumqi, as well as
with Uzbekistan). Here again, joint strategies, or at
least complementary ones, concerning the training of
students in technical subjects might be put forward.
Development aid offers more room for cooperation
between China and the EU. The Chinese authorities are increasingly active in fostering rural development in Central Asia, in particular in the form of
improving agricultural techniques and training agricultural technicians. EU countries have knowledge
on improving glass-house production and irrigation
networks, as well as on developing techniques that
are more respectful of the environment, especially of
water resources, and also on the revival of herding.
These fields are similar to those in which the Chinese
are also seeking to acquire European know-how. Even
if the Chinese credit institutes give priority to a nonexternalised system of financing (the key conditions
for obtaining a loan is the participation of Chinese
companies), some projects favouring partnerships
between Chinese and European companies might be
considered. Bringing Chinese funds and European
technical knowledge together in development efforts
in Central Asia could be pursued.
This does not mean that China and Russia are
without restraint. As spectacular as China’s rise in
power has been over the last ten years, it may suffer
partial setbacks due to domestic difficulties facing
the authorities: growing social unrest; instability
in Xinjiang and Tibet; the slowdown of current
economic dynamics; and the Communist party’s
legitimacy could be questioned if growth stumbles.
All these factors may work to alter the balance in the
years to come and limit China’s leverage and interest
in Central Asia.
4.3. The EU and China on security and development
Possible cooperation with China appears more
limited in the security sector, but some room for
collaboration could probably be developed in
the fight against drug-trafficking. China is in fact
becoming increasingly vulnerable to this scourge
and shows a bit more interest in coordination, for
instance through CARRIC. One high-level EU official
suggested one area of possible partnership, the
chemical precursors required for the transformation
of opium into heroin, which in part come from the
chemical industries of Lanzhou, over which Beijing
could increase its control.
Beijing has also implemented multiple partnerships between Chinese and Central Asian universities in key sectors such as hydrocarbons (for example, it is host to hundreds of Central Asian students
5. Room for cooperation?
Can the “hesitant vicar”, the “reluctant soldier” and
the “silent merchant” cooperate in Central Asia? Both
China and Russia are “total” actors in Central Asia,
not in the sense that they shape the local realities
on the ground, but that they have the capacity to
engage on all fronts. Europe’s own capacity is more
limited. The lack of territorial contiguity and inability
to concurrently influence the political, security,
economic and cultural realms limit its impact.
Moreover, the current European crisis drastically
weakens its legitimacy abroad and signals that the EU
will likely have to limit itself to more modest goals,
and leave more room for manoeuvre to other regional
actors. Its influence in the international arena will be
constrained as long as the debt crisis persists and
internal political crises remain unresolved.
For Russia, even if territorial contiguity and cultural
legacies are in its favour, its demographic decline
will be an impediment to gaining any new influence.
A change in the established political regime at the
Kremlin might contribute to a reshaping of RussiaCentral Asia relations, as well as to the development
of new space for cooperation with Western
countries.
How can Europe strengthen its security-development approach towards Central Asia in light of the
possibilities and restrictions involved in cooperation
and coordination with Russia and China?
22
The EU should increasingly emphasise how it is ‘different’ to Russia and China both as an actor and in
the approach EU institutions and member states
take. The lack of EU visibility in Central Asia is a fact
and cannot be remedied by explaining the complexities of European structures and its relationship to
member states’ activities. Instead, highlighting the
uniqueness of the EU as a broad and diverse actor
should be used as a strength. There is no sense in
portraying Europe as a uniform state actor such as
China and Russia and thus attempting to compete
with them for influence on their terms.
The EU is also different from other actors (except the
U.S.) due to the stress it places on democratic and
human rights values. Whereas the promotion of values is often seen as a burden and especially difficult
to pursue due to the minimal leverage the EU has
in Central Asia, it can also be considered a strength.
Central Asian regimes are interested in having good
links with Europe beyond the growing trade relationship. Europe and its focus on values and reform
is an alternative to the more direct and substantial
influence of Russia and China. Recognition of Central
Asian regimes by European partners affects their
stance towards Moscow and Beijing. And currently
the EU is in no position to become an effective geopolitical energy and security actor in Central Asia by
merely shifting its focus away from values.
Because the larger part of European interests and activities in Central Asia fall under the umbrella of the
security-development nexus, especially in poor and
instable states such as Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, it
would make sense for the EU to develop a clearer narrative on how it sees the links between security and
development, which is currently defining its “brand”
in the region. To do so the EU needs to make tough
choices on which areas to focus development funding
in Central Asia in order to be more effective, have a
greater impact and be more visible. The axes defined
in the current Strategy are too broad and diverse to
have a substantial impact given the limited financial
and human means allocated to achieving these priorities. The current review process of the Strategy that
is underway and expected to be concluded by June
will hopefully outline what the EU plans to achieve
over the coming years in the field of development aid
and cooperation on security matters.
As there is little room for concrete cooperation with
Russia and even less so with China, the EU could
probably forge tighter cooperation and coordina-
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
tion with the U.S. This should go well beyond the
limited OSCE and NATO activities in the region. Both
western partners are well advised to streamline
their approaches to the region – the EU’s Strategy
implementation and the U.S.’s New Silk Road plans
– in order to guarantee that both powers remain
relevant. This is especially important in light of the
forthcoming military withdrawal from Afghanistan.
The U.S.’s focus on hard security and the EU’s soft
security approach have the potential to be complementary, and there is room for greater coordination
in their development aid strategies.
But preparations for a post-2014 Afghanistan and the
need for cooperation between all the regional actors
involved in Afghanistan also offers the EU a window
of opportunity to establish some cooperation with
Russia, the Central Asian governments, and maybe
even China and other actors such as India. For this to
happen Brussels will need to outline how it sees the
relationship between Central Asia and Afghanistan,
and how it foresees it will adapt some of its own programmes that currently focus solely on Central Asia
to include Afghanistan or vice versa.
Increased cooperation is unlikely to be between the
EU and NATO on the one side and the SCO and CSTO
on the other. The EU has informal meetings with
SCO representatives but no official cooperation or
partnership, while NATO does not have official links
with either and prefers to work with Russia through
the NATO Russia Council. Even though the CSTO is
primarily seen as a Russian outfit and the EU and
NATO prefer working with its partners on a bilateral basis, the value gap between the EU and NATO
and the SCO, with its emphasis on the three evils of
terrorism, separatism and religious extremism, is
too wide. The CSTO and SCO have little to offer in
concrete terms, and in relation to Central Asia and
troop withdrawal from Afghanistan it makes more
sense for the EU to seek avenues of cooperation with
China and Russia instead of forging institutional ties
with the CSTO and SCO.
Border control and management is a field where the
EU could cooperate with Russia. In the event that
the EU should choose to step up border management programmes beyond BOMCA, for instance by
deploying a CSDP mission or investing substantially
in an OSCE role on the Tajik-Afghan border, it will
need to come to some kind of arrangement with
Moscow. Joint activities in combating drug-trafficking, for example by institutionalising coopera-
Security and development – The EU compared to China and Russia
tion on information exchange between CARICC and
CABSI, would be very welcome. Higher education
and the social implications of labour migration are
two other possible areas where the EU and Russia
could join forces in some way.
With China there is less scope for joint action in
Central Asia. The EU could propose some joint initiatives on rural development, such as complementary
policies for training agricultural technical professionals or combining initiatives on poverty alleviation
and the development of remote regions. Cooperation
with China could be based on a trade-off between
European technical knowledge and Chinese funds
and investments to the benefit of Central Asians. Of
course the EU and European companies would need
to assess on a case-by-case basis whether it is transferring knowledge to China alone with little gain for
either themselves or Central Asians.
Concluding remarks
None of the three external actors has a genuine desire
to dominate in Central Asia. Geopolitical competition
in the region seems more virtual and symbolic than
real. The European Union argues for democratic
reform and human rights in the Central Asian states,
an approach that is rejected by both Moscow and
Beijing. The EU advances in this area are perceived
by Russia and China as interference in Central Asian
domestic affairs or as strategies to contain their own
influence. In the security realm, the EU does not
offer comprehensive regional security cooperation
initiatives besides ad hoc security conferences. Its
strength lies in development programmes that often
have soft-security components. Meanwhile Brussels
prefers to work through NATO and the OSCE which
can be viewed as competitors to the CSTO and the
SCO. However, there are also potential areas for
cooperation, for instance in the development sector,
in which the different priorities of the external actors
are complementary: food security and humanitarian
aid for Russia; Chinese infrastructure projects; and
the EU’s focus on poverty reduction.
But beyond the contradictory or complementary
nature of these external actors, Russia’s and China’s
primary interest is to protect their domestic situation from any destabilisation coming from Central
Asia. Their economic strategies are proactive
(Russia’s new integration policies, China’s investments in infrastructure), but their security policies
23
are mostly reactive and defensive. The effectiveness
and cohesion of Russian and European leverage in
the region is also impeded by the diversity of actors
shaping their respective policies. Their capacity to
develop active plans for cooperation are therefore
limited by the defensive nature of their involvement
in the region, a certain level of bureaucratic inertia
and the lack of a unified vision for their missions in
Central Asia. It seems difficult to believe that these
issues can be fundamentally altered or improved in
the coming years.
Furthermore, elements not related to Central Asia
per se directly influence the actions of each external
actor in the region: the European debt crisis limits
allocations and means, while U.S.-Russia tensions
over missile-defence or over the Syrian crisis may
contribute to Moscow’s rejection of Western-based
projects in Central Asia. Meanwhile the competition
patterns between external actors are encouraged by
the local governments as they enable them to enforce
multi-vector strategies by pitting these actors against
each other. This results in multiple uncoordinated
initiatives over which they can exert a greater control.
The established elites will therefore probably regard
proposals for joint strategies with suspicion.
Moreover, do Europe, Russia and China want to cooperate together in the interests of the Central Asians
or only to avoid patterns of competition arising
amongst themselves? Concerns over competition
largely arise from the energy reserves the region has
to offer. None of the external actors are eager to take
on direct security involvement unless its own vital
territorial interests are at stake. Russia remains the
primus inter pares in security affairs in Central Asia
and prefers other parties to stay out of the region, especially the U.S., but there is little competition for the
hearts and minds of Central Asians. Meanwhile there
is little contact or rivalry so far between Western regional security organisations and the CSTO and SCO.
This could change when NATO’s withdrawal from
Afghanistan takes shape.
In a region where because of energy and security
interests external actors take little interest in genuine development for the sake of the people and the
countries involved, and where local regimes remain
wary of reform, the EU can do little in the short term.
Europe should continue to focus on its own values
and approaches, even if these do seem in contradiction to those of other countries, and should continue
to seek positive developments on the ground.
24
EUCAM Working Paper No. 11
Established in 2008 as a project seeking to monitor the implementation of the EU Strategy for Central Asia, EUCAM has grown into a
knowledge hub on broader Europe-Central Asia relations. Specifically,
the project aims to:
• Scrutinise European policies towards Central Asia, paying specific attention to security, development and the promotion of democratic values within the context of Central Asia’s position in world politics;
• Enhance knowledge of Europe’s engagement with Central Asia
through top-quality research and by raising awareness among European
policy-makers and civil society representatives, as well as discuss European policies among Central Asian communities;
• Expand the network of experts and institutions from European countries and Central Asian states and provide a forum to debate on European-Central Asian relations.
Currently, the broader programme is coordinated by FRIDE, in partnership with the Karelian Institute and CEPS, with the support of the Open
Society Foundations and the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The
main outputs of the programme are a series of policy briefs and comprehensive reports on key issues facing the Europe-Central Asia relationship.
Please follow our work on www.eucentralasia.eu. If you have any comments or suggestions, please email us at [email protected]
www.fride.org
http://www.uef.fi/ktl/etusivu
http://www.ceps.eu
FRIDE is a European think tank for global action, based in Madrid,
which provides fresh and innovative thinking on Europe’s role on the
international stage. Our mission is to inform policy and practice in
order to ensure that the EU plays a more effective role in supporting
multilateralism, democratic values, security and sustainable development.
We seek to engage in rigorous analysis of the difficult debates on democracy
and human rights, Europe and the international system, conflict and
security, and development cooperation. FRIDE benefits from political
independence and the diversity of views and intellectual background of
its international team.
Founded in 1971, the Karelian Institute is a unit of the Faculty of Social
Sciences and Business Studies of the University of Eastern Finland.
It engages in basic and applied multi-disciplinary research, supports
the supervision of postgraduate studies and researcher training, and
participates in teaching. It focuses mainly on three thematic priorities:
Borders and Russia; Ethnicity and Culture; and Regional and Rural
Studies.
The Centre for European Policy Studies (CEPS) in Brussels is among the
most experienced and authoritative think tanks operating in the European
Union today. It aims to carry out state-of-the-art policy research leading
to solutions to the challenges facing Europe today and to achieve high
standards of academic excellence and maintain unqualified independence.
CEPS provides a forum for discussion among all stakeholders in the
European policy process.